Bethenny Comes Clean About Cancelled Talk Show: I Felt Diluted & Filtered

This month, it was announced that Bethenny Frankle’s daytime talk show, Bethenney, would not be renewed. The former reality show star started off as a break-out star on the Real Housewives of New York, appearing earlier on The Apprentice: Martha Stewart, and later landing her own spin-off, Bethenny Ever After. Her talk show premiered nationwide on September 9, 2013 and was officially cancelled February 14 due to low ratings. On Monday, the 43-year-old finally addressed her departure penning an open letter. Check it out below.

Well this is an open letter, so maybe you have heard the news. “Bethenny” won’t be coming back for another season.

People ask me how I feel about this, so I wanted to share it with you straight up.

What I love about doing my talk show is connecting to women. I love the opportunity to inspire, to be inspired and to be able to help women to be their best, succeed and feel better about themselves.

I also love working with such an incredibly talented and hard working staff and crew. Unlike working with my assistant, daughter and Cookie in my apartment, I interact with hundreds of people every day. I see a unique cast of characters and those days are filled with laughter.

The most difficult part of this departure was having to tell them that they were out of a job although they know it is part of the career path they have chosen. Even more amazing is how professional they are and how despite the cancellation, every day they come in wanting to produce the best shows they can. I have heard horror stories about the end of a show run where the staff checks out completely. They take pride in this work and this show and they are finishing as strong as we started. That is inspiring to me.

My friend Robert Verdi described doing a talk show better than anyone. Before we started, he told me, “You are a traffic cop.” What he meant was that to guide the amazing interviews, business segments and relationship talk, you are directing traffic. “Coming up,” “When we come back,” “Up next,” and the list goes on and on.

In order to have the freedom to create a talk show, there are required elements that the job entails. This is the part that I didn’t enjoy so much and that wasn’t authentic to me. In addition, I tend to be quite inappropriate which may not be suitable for daytime television or for the suits that run network television nationwide.

Unlike my time on Bravo, I felt a bit diluted, filtered and somewhat constricted. I am a free spirit. My late father (a horse trainer) used to say “She is a mustang. You need to let her run.” I am more comfortable in my natural surroundings and in a setting where I’m surrounded by crazy, where anything goes and where I can be authentically me. When interviewed about the show, I always said that it could only work if I was true to myself and only if it was genuinely a good fit and marriage which it turned out not to be.

I am so grateful for the experience and to those of you who went on this journey with me. It was fun, exciting, scary and a great challenge.

As easy as people like Ellen, Oprah, Wendy, Rachael and Steve make it look, it is one of the hardest jobs I have ever done, and I have so much more respect for them having been through this experience. They are warriors and champions who make a very difficult job look effortless.

So to answer how I feel, I am relieved. What I really want right now is to be with my daughter, to do yoga, to focus on Skinnygirl and my writing, and to give myself a break. I have been striving and climbing and white-knuckling for so long that I need a rest from the grind. I’m a little over myself and wouldn’t blame anyone else for being over me as well.

I love you all and we will be in touch as we always were. Thank you for always being there.

Love,
Bethenny

Were you surprised that Bethenny was cancelled? And will you miss the show?

[Bethenny]

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